7:00 am on my side of the ocean and 'SallySue Sun' has not poked her nose up yet.

Last evening she drifted below the horizon before 5:00 pm. I drug myself away from ‘Rafa’ my new musical companion (piano I purchased here in Germany) and stepped out into the brisk evening air, lights twinkling and dangling from barren trees, and excitement in the Weinachtzeit German air. The end of 2007 rapidly approaches.

As is my natural tendency this time of year, my thoughts are roaming over 2007. When that begins to happen, I roam over 2006, 2000, 1994, 1990… the years cascade across my thoughts and tickle my memories. Sitting in my local Chinese restaurant (below my apartment) I enjoy my first Christmas gift (a meal from my neighbor i.e. owner of said restaurant.)

As is also my natural tendency at this time of year, I begin to re-read the books that have become my staples over the years. These books always seem to re-establish me, remind me of my focus, and basically kick me back into shape. Ordering Your Private World by Gordon McDonald, Spiritual Disciplines by Richard Foster, and A.W. Tozer’s The Knowledge of the Holy.

So… last evening as I sat with my mentor, Gordon McDonald (not to be confused with the heavier and weightier George McDonald read) over a Chinese meal, I am reminded of my failures. If one was to list them… - oh Dear Sweet Jesus let’s not go there…

But God.

And within that one incomplete phrase lie the message I relish.

Morning finally breaks across the mountains of the Black Forest and I peer from my bedroom window; a smile begins its birth. Now it is a full-fledged belly-laugh. If one was of the mindset to title a life, my choice for the title of my life would be Dancing with Failure.

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A little about me

I am in the world almost every day. Okay, daily.Are you?

I am called to be salt and light.

A few days ago, one of the waiters at the local diner that I frequent in the wee hours of the morning shared some very personal information. I looked as she opened up her heart with her pitcher of coffee poised in her hand, ready to pour - but not pouring. She held it as if it were a shield. The longer she shared her heart the lower the coffee pot dropped. And finally when she asked me my thoughts, the coffee pot sat beside me on the table. We talked. We laughed. We shared our lives and our thoughts. It was a time to shine a little light and sprinkle a little salt.

Are you finding places that you meet people searching for the same things?

I have been a commissioned missionary. I left the foreign mission field in November of 2014. Now I am a home missionary. Not commissioned by an organization. Commissioned by Jesus.

Life is a mission field. I was a missionary in my classroom as a teacher before I left for the foriegn mission field. Before that I was a missionary with my family, neighbors and even in my church. I was a missionary from the moment I accepted Christ as my Savior at age 7.

So are you.

We are mutating missionaries.I'm blogging about the experience. Wanna join me?